Ma Maison

"No," said the waiter, "you can't have a menu." He looked a little sheepish and then added, "too many other people are looking at menus just now, and we don't have enough to go around." It was just about the only thing that didn't go smoothly during a dinner at the newly opened Ma Maison restaurant in the Ma Maison Sofitel, 8555 Beverly Blvd., West Hollywood, (213) 278-5444. It's warm and pleasant in this pretty room that makes you feel as if you are sitting inside a great big urban greenhouse.

Twenty years ago, I was talking with the owner of a restaurant-supply store when the name of Ma Maison came up. He paused for a moment, awe-struck. "Mamasan!" he gushed. "That's a great restaurant! Me and the old lady drove by it the other day--the parking lot was full! " "Ma Maison" was a name to conjure with, even on that crass commercial level. Maybe only a few thousand people actually ate at L.A.'

Just in time for Christmas: Jack Lemmon, Ed McMahon and Suzanne Pleshette arrived by horse-drawn carriages last Monday at the ribbon cutting for Ma Maison Sofitel, that long-anticipated hotel at Beverly and La Cienega boulevards. And the new Ma Maison restaurant, in the $55-million facility, also opened to the celebrities and others attending the festivities. The restaurant was expected to be ready for the public by last Thursday.

Seven years ago Patrick Terrail closed his Hollywood Diner on Fairfax, the Franco-American bistro he opened after the demise of Ma Maison, his original establishment. Terrail, who still owned the Diner's building, then leased the space to Silvio De Mori and turned his energy to re-creating Ma Maison at the new Sofitel Hotel on the corner of Beverly and La Cienega. De Mori ran the former Hollywood Diner as Tutto Bene until filing for Chapter 7 (liquidation) bankruptcy last year.

The after-dinner cigar is pretty much a thing of the past in American restaurants today. Some eating places, of course, ban smoking altogether. Others allow cigarettes, but forbid cigars and pipes as well--or, at the least, restrict the enjoyment of them to bar areas or lounges. At least one Los Angeles restaurateur thinks this is a shame, and has decided to do something about it--once a month, at any rate. Starting Nov.

Ma Maison Restaurant, the celebrated West Hollywood gathering place for such stars as the late Orson Welles, will shut down Thursday, but its owner promises to reopen at a new location. Located in an old house and covered patio on Melrose Avenue, Ma Maison opened 10 years ago and immediately attracted Hollywood's brightest luminaries. "When we started the dining scene here was a desert," owner Patrick Terrail said. "Many of the best restaurants in Los Angeles today are offshoots of Ma Maison's.

Ma Maison, that popular West Hollywood eatery of the stars and other luminaries, will close Thursday because the 22,000-square-foot property it occupies has been sold. That's the word from industry spokesmen, although Patrick Terrail, Ma Maison owner, was unavailable for comment. When contacted, Joe Lenzi of the Novagroup Realty in Beverly Hills, verified that he represented both sides in the $2-million-plus transaction, which closed escrow Nov. 1.

It was 9:20 p.m. and a seven-hour public hearing on the Ma Maison Sofitel Hotel was winding down. A weary member of the Board of Zoning Appeals rested his chin in the palm of his hand. An attorney for the hotel removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. A water pitcher and coffee pot were empty. Harald Hahn, president of a group of homeowners who live near the hotel, walked slowly toward the podium.

Seven years ago Patrick Terrail closed his Hollywood Diner on Fairfax, the Franco-American bistro he opened after the demise of Ma Maison, his original establishment. Terrail, who still owned the Diner's building, then leased the space to Silvio De Mori and turned his energy to re-creating Ma Maison at the new Sofitel Hotel on the corner of Beverly and La Cienega. De Mori ran the former Hollywood Diner as Tutto Bene until filing for Chapter 7 (liquidation) bankruptcy last year.

There's something missing from the popular Celestino in Beverly Hills these days: chef/co-owner Celestino Drago himself. In a dispute with his partner, investor Art Vella, Drago quit the restaurant as of Feb. 13. He retains his 50% interest in the establishment, and the place will keep the Celestino name--but he says he has no further involvement with it either as a chef or a manager. "I hope Art will do very well with the place," Drago says.

Re "Drai's Restaurant: Parlez-Vous le Show Biz?" (July 7): I appreciate the panache of Drai's. But the article left out an important ingredient in Drai's recipe for success: the presence of chef Claude Segal, whose culinary career spans Ma Maison, Bistango and Picnic. Segal has demonstrated mastery in the kitchen without a lot of bravado. It's simply "on the plate," and, if it wasn't, the powerbrokers or just plain people would simply not keep coming back, as they, and I, continue to do. STEPHANIE MARDESICH San Pedro

When Patrick Terrail closed the original Ma Maison nine years ago, there was a lot of talk about where people would be heading for Friday lunch. Doing lunch at Ma Maison, or M.M. as the gossip columnists called it, was a ritual, and its tables were as sought after as a three-picture deal. Although many have tried--Chasen's, Il Giardino, Picnic, even Terrail himself at Ma Maison Sofitel--no restaurant has come even close to replacing the old Astroturfed spot on Melrose.

Patrick Terrail unfolds himself from the booth and begins to work the room. The man who once owned Ma Maison moves to the table in the center. He bends over, kisses hands, kisses air. Slowly, majestically, he circumnavigates the small room, stopping at each table as if this were his restaurant and he wasn't just another customer. The seats are filled with former patrons of Ma Maison. To one woman he sends a bottle of Champagne.

Suntory Beer's latest promotional brainstorm, reports the specialist magazine Japan Design Close-Up, is a new label that reads Beer Nouveau. Obviously an attempt to cash in on the Japanese craze for Beaujolais Nouveau, it must give Suntory drinkers the confident feeling that the beer was made only a few months ago. Or hey, within the last year, for sure. I'll Give It a 9, Because I Can Grasp It American Bandstand Grill is a Miami-based restaurant chain owned by--who else?

There's something missing from the popular Celestino in Beverly Hills these days: chef/co-owner Celestino Drago himself. In a dispute with his partner, investor Art Vella, Drago quit the restaurant as of Feb. 13. He retains his 50% interest in the establishment, and the place will keep the Celestino name--but he says he has no further involvement with it either as a chef or a manager. "I hope Art will do very well with the place," Drago says.

It's all very well for Woody Allen to make fun of Los Angeles by suggesting that its residents eat "bowls of mashed yeast" (as he did in "Annie Hall")--but New York City has many more vegetarian and/or "health food" restaurants than L.A. It has so many, in fact, that it's about to share one of them with us: The proprietors of Luma in the Chelsea section of Manhattan are looking for a location in Santa Monica or Venice, where they hope to open a West Coast Luma as early as this fall.

West Hollywood's request for a preliminary injunction to stop construction of the 10-story Ma Maison luxury hotel and restaurant has been turned down by a Los Angeles Superior Court judge. Attorneys for developer Sheldon Gordon, a general partner at Huntley Drive Associates, said they are ready to start building on the site abutting West Hollywood at the northwest corner of La Cienega and Beverly boulevards. A sliver of the hotel site was annexed by the city of Los Angeles in 1979.

New billboards across the street from the Beverly Center depict a smiling waiter in a striped apron, bearing a scale model of an imposing 11-story building on a silver platter. "Ma Maison, the hotel," the billboard announces. "Opening Spring, 1987." But some nearby residents are not smiling about the prospect of living across the street from the renowned French restaurant and hotel of the same name. Project designers, however, are confident that the neighbors will learn to love it.

Sex Discrimination Suit: Attorney Gloria Allred filed a class-action sex discrimination lawsuit Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court seeking to require two restaurants, Ma Maison/Sofitel Hotel & Restaurant and Citrus, to hire women, not just men, to wait on tables. The suit was filed on behalf of Kellye McKinna, 29, who said she was never permitted to wait on tables in the formal dining room at Ma Maison. (Filed March 5, 1990, Case No. C754109)

Two upper crust Los Angeles restaurants were served a sex discrimination lawsuit Thursday by an experienced waitress who claims she was denied employment because of her sex. The class action suit, which seeks unspecified monetary damages, was filed by Kellye McKinna, 29, against Citrus Restaurant and the Ma Maison Sofitel Hotel and Restaurant.